This invention relates to a unique and improved series of designs for a device to construct interlocking road mat segments for temporary roads. Such mat segments (or "mats") are typically used where there is a temporary need for roads to carry heavy vehicular traffic, such as trucks, where the ground surface could not otherwise support such heavy vehicles (such as low lying marshlands) and where the temporary need for a road and the expense involved in constructing a permanent road would not justify the construction of a permanent road. The mats contemplated by the present invention are typically made of heavy wood timbers, are of a uniform size and construction, and are often constructed to interlock to provide a more secure roadway. Such mats might be constructed by hand or, as is now known in the prior art, with the assistance of an apparatus such as that described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,922,598 dated May 8, 1990.
The device taught by the present invention incorporates significant improvements over earlier designs of mat-fabrication devices, such improvements including the use of the unique template to construct a uniquely-designed double layer interlocking mat and the use of a hydraulic-powered mechanism to turn a partially-constructed mat upside down on to a specially-designed crimping table for crimping the ends of nails as they are driven into the timbers out of which each mat is constructed.